Fox reporter debunks Trump-assassination-plot accusations

On Wednesday night, Fox News White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich broke the news that the same guidance on deadly force that appeared in the Trump operations order was also in the orders for the FBI raids on President Biden’s homes.

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Following a 24-hour news cycle’s worth of MAGA outrage over Donald Trump’s claims that President Joe Biden authorized an assassination plot against him, Fox News White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich put the nail in the coffin of this latest Trumpian conspiracy theory on Wednesday night.

Heinrich’s scoop that the search warrants of Biden’s homes in Delaware contained the same standard “deadly force” language as the Mar-a-Lago raid came after a number of pro-Trump Fox News stars wondered if Biden had told the FBI “it would be OK to kill Donald Trump.”

“A person familiar with the Hur investigation confirms that the standard Department of Justice policy statement regarding the use of deadly force was also included in the operations order for the searches at President Biden’s residences in Delaware,” Heinrich tweeted on Wednesday evening.

“CONTEXT: yesterday, former President Trump suggested that the Biden administration wanted to kill him during a search of his Mar-a-Lago estate. A fundraising email read, ‘Joe Biden was locked & loaded ready to take me out. The FBI said standard protocol was followed, no additional steps were taken and there was no departure from the norm,” she continued. “This news about the deadly force policy also being in place for the FBI searches at Biden's homes underscores that point.”

Indeed, Republicans and conservative media were set ablaze on Tuesday afternoon after motions from Trump’s classified documents case were unsealed and it was discovered that there was a “policy statement” included in the search warrant of the ex-president’s residence that detailed the FBI’s “deadly force” protocols.

MAGA lawmakers and far-right influencers claimed that “Biden DOJ and FBI were planning to assassinate Pres Trump and gave the green light.” And on Tuesday evening, Fox News reporter Brooke Singman published a story early boosting those claims with the provocative headline: “Biden administration authorized 'Use of Deadly Force' in Mar-a-Lago raid.”

After that report went up, Fox News on-air anchors and hosts ran wild with the “quite shocking” story, calling it “not standard operating procedure” and speculating that the bureau's agents “were looking for a little action” so they “could engage in deadly physical force.” The FBI issued a rare statement noting that it “followed standard protocol in this search as we do for all search warrants, which includes a standard policy statement limiting the use of deadly force.”

Singman’s digital story was soon updated with the FBI’s statement, and the headline was eventually tamed down to “Trump highlights Biden admin authorizing ‘deadly use of force’ in Mar-a-Lago raid.”

Despite the FBI’s statement, the network’s MAGA primetime stars continued to rage about the “deadly force” order, with the coverage spilling over to Wednesday morning across Fox News and its sister channel Fox Business Network. Notably, after Fox shifted to its “straight news” programming in mid-morning, the network dropped the story altogether.

Outside of an additional line added to Singman’s digital story on Wednesday evening, the network has yet to mention Heinrich’s report on the air. Fox News did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The White House correspondent also tweeted on Thursday morning that the FBI had confirmed her reporting on the Biden search warrants, noting that fellow Fox News correspondent David Spunt had received the bureau’s statement.

“The FBI followed standard protocol in this search as we do for all search warrants, which includes a standard policy statement limiting the use of deadly force. No one ordered additional steps to be taken and there was no departure from the norm in this matter,” the FBI’s comment says. “The standard deadly force policy statement included in the operations order for the search of the former president’s residence was also included in the operations order for the search of the sitting president’s residence in Delaware, as is standard practice for all FBI operations orders.”

Additionally, Attorney General Merrick Garland—who has also been accused by MAGA world of authorizing the so-called assassination plot on Trump—noted that the instructions are “just part of a standard operations plan for searches, and in fact it was even used in the consensual searches for President Biden's home.”

Heinrich, meanwhile, has previously come under fire from the conservative cable giant’s top stars for publicly refuting MAGA conspiracy theories. In fact, after she fact-checked an election-denying tweet from Trump that also tagged Fox News host Sean Hannity, former Fox News star Tucker Carlson and Hannity attempted to get Heinrich fired.

More than three years after that effort, Heinrich still remains at the network while Carlson was canned last year.